


Iron Chains

by thatsarcasticidiot



Series: Sad [5]
Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Abuse, Depression, Homelessness, jaemin has shitty parents what, no romance or relationships in this just had to put the ones that are coming up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-25
Updated: 2018-11-25
Packaged: 2019-08-29 10:59:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16742704
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thatsarcasticidiot/pseuds/thatsarcasticidiot
Summary: Jaemin has never felt so alone. He's never felt thisstuck. Unmoving. Watching everyone move at double the speed he was.





	Iron Chains

**Author's Note:**

> Yo yo yo I'm back with another one of the sad series. Just gotta warn y'all that this one includes abusive parents and an abusive home setting so please please please skeorut if you aren't comfortable.

Jaemin doesn't know when it started. It wasn't exactly something he expected. It affected him only slightly, losing concentration occasionally, becoming quieter. He was still waking up every morning, catching his train and heading to school. It was just a bad week. But others began to notice his irritability, his loneliness. Loneliness is a pretty scary feeling, especially when you know you've done it to yourself. It was a type of isolation Jaemin didn’t even understand. He felt lonely when he was alone. He felt lonely in crowds. He felt alone even when he was with others. How can you fix such a situation? Jaemin still pushed forwards. It wasn’t that bad then. Jaemin was swimming out, deep, but not deep enough to cause any issues.

It got to a scary point where Jaemin wasn’t even sure if he was alive. Everything just felt so fuzzy. He must be dead, because he never feels like he’s actually _there_ with people. This isn’t what being alive is supposed to feel like. You’re supposed to feel things, feel emotion. Jaemin just felt like he was hovering between two worlds, existing but not simultaneously. He didn’t have a purpose in either world. Believe it or not, this wasn’t bad. It affected him, but he always had a gift for hiding his feelings. Jaemin’s friends always told him he could make a great actor. Jaemin thinks they’re very wrong. 

Guilt. Jaemin felt guilty. For _everything_. Things that hadn’t even happened yet, he felt guilty for, and he knew he’s done this to himself. Jaemin felt guilty for pissing his friends off, for being annoying. But Jaemin is good at pretending. He’s become quite good at acting like everything is okay. He still laughs when others laugh, and cries when they cry, even though he feels none of what they do. Their idols, the people they used to look up to don’t give him that feeling in the bottom of his stomach anymore, and he’s just lost interest for the things he used to love. His friends didn’t know of course, they couldn’t find out, because Jaemin had to be _normal_. That didn’t deter the complete disconnect he felt between himself and his friends though, and though it seemed as if he he fit right in, really he was miles away, his brain completely shut down, apart from his ability to act. Because that’s what he had to do to survive in this world, right? Right.

Motivation was a hard thing for a Jaemin to find these days too. A question that created a wall between him, and a normal life was “what’s the point?”. There was absolutely no reason for anything that Jaemin did if it didn’t make him feel anyway. So what was the point? That’s when he began noticing the little things, like how no one looks for him outside of school. How his phone doesn’t ring. How his doesn’t hear the high pitched chime to alert him about incoming texts anymore.

He spent his days in his room, and that’s when his parents noticed. His parents weren’t exactly loving from the start, disappointed with their son’s subpar academic performance. That wasn’t good for their image. They had to be a picture perfect family, his parents couldn’t have their friends gossiping about the Na’s eldest son, especially when he’s been acting the way he has. The rumours had spread to his parents’ rich people friends, that their kid was lazy and unsociable, rude and antisocial. Jaemin was letting his family down, and he knew that.

There was one night where Jaemin reached breaking point. He didn’t know what he would do. So he did what any child would, and went to his parents, looking for support. He told them that he wasn’t okay, that he barely trusted himself, and since he was already on thin fucking ice with his parents, they took matters into their own hands. They beat the happiness into him. Quite literally.

They beat him the night he told them, the night after and the night after that. By then, he had learnt that if he 'behaved' then they would treat him pleasantly, but if he even showed a sign of sadness, it would lead to a beating late when everyone was asleep. His parents couldn't have a child like Jaemin. He tarnishes their image largely and makes them look bad. That's what they tell him. Like it would make his emptiness go away.

Spoiler alert; it doesn't.

Jaemin had never felt so alone. He was now in a situation where he couldn't get help, lord knows what his parents would do to him if he managed to tell someone external, and he felt so stuck. Unmoving. Watching everyone else move at double the speed he was.

Suddenly, his life began moving way faster than everyone else's, a few months after the beating started. His parents had kicked him out when they found out that people had realised that they frequently beat their eldest son.

The whole situation was so ironic. His parents beat him to save face, but now that everything was laid out on the table, they painted themselves as villains. It was still Jaemin's fault though. If he didn't frustrate his parents so much, maybe they wouldn't have become the monsters that they did. Maybe that makes Jaemin the real monster.

He just felt so defeated by life, struck down too many times to stand again. He was at rockbottom, no home, no family, no friends. He met the guys by chance, at a party he'd been forced to go to in order to keep crashing at a 'friend's'. He was tired of all the uncertainty and unreliability in his life, the constant change, and lack of a sense of security. This was the eighth party he'd unwillingly attended, just to find a place to keep him warm and hydrated for the night. Jaemin was sick of this, of sitting on bathroom floors for the entire duration of nightfall while mindless airheads yelled and drank outside.

He was startled from his drowsy state, when a few boys burst into the bathroom; now was really not the time for annoying, self conceited assholes, Jaemin thought, already irked from the never ending pounding of loud music through the floors.

Each of them froze simultaneously when they noticed that another person was inhabiting the bathroom, and Jaemin used this time of awkward eye contact resourcefully to count, and analyse the boys. There were six of them, all with varying shades of brown hair, excluding one, who had a mop of vibrant orange sitting on his head.

One of them opened their mouths, only to let a monotone 'uh' leave his mouth. Smart.

Jaemin waved toward the door to the dance floor half heartedly, by way of explanation, he lowered his head slightly as he murmured one word, "people."

The boy with a mess of orange hair slowly sank down the wall beside him, an exhausted "tell me about it" gracing Jaemin's ears. 

"Name's Donghyuck by the way, these are some people I don't really know that well but none of us actually want to be here so there's that." 

"Jaemin."

-

**Author's Note:**

> I really don't like this one but I never like my writing anyway so what's new :P oh yeah and in case you haven't been able to tell Donghyuck is my 2nd ult


End file.
